Two Cent Rant - Je Suis Charlie

"It is clear that not in one thing alone, but in many ways equality and freedom of speech are a good thing." 

- Herodotus 

"People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use." 

- Soren Kierkegaard

Let me preface this little rant with the following statement: I rate all acts of unprovoked and unjustified violence, whether against individuals or the masses, as despicable and inexcusable. There is in my opinion no valid reason to harm or kill people who haven't attempted to harm or kill you first.

I also support freedom of speech. You should have the right to voice your opinion whenever you like without fear of violent retaliation. You should also have the right to ignore other people's opinions or to engage those who hold opinions you disagree with in open discourse.

That being said, I believe that freedom of speech, when placed in the hands of the ignorant, short-sighted, and ego-driven, is a double-edged sword that can cut both ways. The shootings in Paris last week are a painful example of free speech backfiring on those most eager to exercise it.

Before you accuse me of victim-blaming, allow me to elaborate.

Let's pretend for a moment that you hate Mike Tyson with a passion. If you ran into him at the airport, would you exercise your free speech? Would you tell him he's scum or call him a wife-beater, rapist, and ear-biter?

Why not?

Body, head.

There aren't any laws against insults but there are laws against assault so you should have nothing to fear, right?

It's not that Tyson would be justified in beating you senseless for insulting him, only that you should know better than to poke an angry bear.

Al Queda, ISIS (or ISIL, or whatever the fuck they're calling themselves now), and other extremists are crazed, wounded bears. Free speech your ass off bro, but if you toss insults at those bears, you should expect to be mauled.

Is this to say that radical Islam should be left untouched? That we should reprimand people who criticize religion or sensor magazines, blogs, and news articles to avoid offending certain people?

Of course not.

Radicalism, be it theological, ideological, or political, is a mind-virus that spreads like wild fire under the right conditions. These conditions are ignorance, poverty, oppression, and disillusionment. Anyone who tells you that all the answers to your problems can be found in a 1,500 year old book is a bold-faced liar, and the only way you'll believe that lie is if you're poor, ignorant, and angry enough.

The answer is never found at the polar extremes but somewhere between the two, in the nebulous grey zone. Radical ideologies are oversimplifications; they create the illusion that only two valid answers exist to a certain question. They force a "this or that" scenario onto people even when no such scenario exists.

When you buy into one of these answers, you trade freedom of thought for freedom of speech.

A lot of these "new" (see: radical) atheists pretend to be modern-day crusaders liberating believers from the shackles of religion. They claim that, behind the sarcasm and venom lurks a concern for the wellbeing of their fellow humans.

They would have us believe they champion truth and education, but one need only look at their methods to see that words and deeds don't align.

If radical ideologies perpetuate themselves best when certain conditions abound, and we know what those conditions are, shouldn't we try to alleviate them? Isn't that the best way to fight the good fight?

I'm no teacher but I'm pretty sure scorn, mockery, and insults are horrible ways to teach anyone anything. You want to convince a group of people that their ways are wrong? Try not profaning their holiest symbols first. That sorta kills the dialogue.

These anti-theists and radical atheists aren't solving any problems: they're making them worse.

Charlie Hebdo, the magazine targeted by the radicals in Paris, made a point of taunting some of the most unstable and dangerous people on the planet. These terrorists are so disillusioned with the world they live in and so hateful of Westerners that they would gladly die just to take a few of infidels down with them.

Those twelve people certainly didn't deserve to die, but is it surprising that they did? Not really, especially considering Charlie Hebdo was bombed only three years ago. The people who worked and died for that magazine are the sorriest martyrs I've ever heard of, but they're martyrs nonetheless: they died for their cause.

Do you own a magazine and want to wage war against radical Islam? Here's what you do: superimpose pictures of atrocities committed in Allah's name with passages from the Qu'ran that prohibit said atrocities.

"What actions are most excellent? To gladden the heart of human beings, to feed the hungry, to help the afflicted, to lighten the sorrow of the sorrowful, and to remove the sufferings of the injured." 

Or point out the contradictions between radical Islam and its moderate cousins. Or highlight the good, selfless deeds of Muslims around the world. Or educate people on the different branches of Islam.

"How is that a solution? Terrorists are beyond educating. They don't want to talk or 'be saved;' they just want to kill infidels."

True, education and respectful dialogue won't stop terrorists, but neither will drawing pictures of Muhammad blowing the pope. Truth is, the most extreme cases are beyond repair.

The goal isn't to save the guys wearing bomb-vests--once you resolve to give your life in Allah's name, it's probably too late for you--it's to prevent Muslims from putting on the vest in the first place.

If you want to help, do anything but troll.

Unless of course you never wanted to help in the first place. In that case, be a troll. Say what you want, poke fun, satirize, whatever: it's your right and I'll defend it with you if anyone tries to take it away.

Just don't pretend you're on a noble crusade to spread truth and save those who have been deceived by evil organized religion.

/rant over

(P.S. Terrorist attacks always spark off a bunch of this "Islam is a religion of hate" nonsense. People love to demonize the youngest of the Abrahamic religions, quoting brutal passages as evidence that it is far worse than both Judaism and Christianity. I'll tackle this topic in my next post so stay tuned.)

Restless

Have you noticed what's going on around the world lately? Whether it's Mexico City, Hong Kong, Ferguson, or New York, the story is the same.

People are starting to wake up to reality and their reaction is one of outrage and anger.

When cops shoot unarmed kids, governments place corporate interests ahead of planetary ones, and laws are broken by the very people paid to uphold them, we should push back.

I probably don't need to tell you that all these protests are connected. If you trace the issues back to their source, you will find the same three culprits grinning sheepishly: greed, hatred, and ignorance.

Thankfully information technology is helping dispel ignorance all around the world. Try as they may, the 1% can't keep a lid on all the dirt they're doing. All it takes is one brave whistle blower  and the whole world finds out.

If you want to know why so many people across the planet are taking a stand, it's because, for the first time, they actually know what's really going on.

Our honeymoon of blissful ignorance is coming to an end. Soon enough we'll have to take a stand and affirm what we all know intuitively and factually: that rule by the few at the expense of the many is a broken model which has and always will result in corruption.

Things simply can't go on like this indefinitely. Sooner or later, something is going to have to give. Either we let short-sighted elitists drag our planet into the dumps or we rise up and take charge, not so we can install a new oligarchy to rule over us but so we can tear the rotten system down and replace it with something better.

Before we can get to this stage though, we have to learn a few important lessons.

Love Your Enemies

Moral outrage is good. So is unrest. It motivates people to get off their asses, put down the gossip mags, and act against the destructive forces lined up against us. The problem, as I outlined at the end of this post, is that we can't combat greed, ignorance, and hatred with greed, ignorance, and hatred.

We have to be above the scum, not swimming in it. Our cause might be righteous but when we employ violence, we defeat ourselves.

I totally understand the impulse to act violently in the face of corruption. I can only imagine the acidic hate that would boil in my veins if one of my (unarmed) kids got shot by a cop.

That being said, police officers are not the root of the problem, only a symptom.

Sure, there are plenty of racist cops out there. Then there's the straight arrow who got bullied in school and signed up so he could finally get a taste of power. And guess what power does? It corrupts. Aside from these unfortunate cases though, cops are just like everyone else, average Joe's and Jane's trying to make a living.

There are easy and effective remedies for police brutality. You could equip cops with body cameras, as some departments have already done. Here's another idea: you could stop giving them second-hand tanks and military-grade weapons. That might slow things down a bit.

So why isn't this happening on a grand scale?

Who do you think is giving police departments enough artillery to take out a middle-eastern dictator? The same people who have the power to mandate body cameras on all officers but choose not to.

The same people who are trying to kill net neutrality, spy on their own citizens, and allow corporations to ravage our planet.

There's no conspiracy anymore: our would-be masters do their dirt right out in the open. Their arrogance borders on madness. They think they can do whatever they like, that they stand above the unfair laws they themselves set up.

They're confident because they've met resistance before and overcame it with ease by sewing discord, distracting, and downplaying. Which leads us to lesson number 2.

Move with Purpose

In a lot of ways, Occupy Wallstreet was a massive blunder. It raised awareness on the widening gap between the richest 1% and everyone else but it failed to produce a coherent strategy to level out the playing field.

Occupy Wallstreet was a child's tantrum. Mom and dad know we're pissed, but they also know that we're powerless, leaderless, purposeless. All they have to do is keep baffling us with bullshit and we'll never rise up and take what's rightfully ours: the world.

As I said, outrage and unrest are great motivators, but alone they lead to... nothing. Corrupt governments are immune to protest because they don't give a shit about what protestors think. What do they care if a few thousand people make a fuss? So long as their bills get passed and donations keep coming in, all is well.

Protests send a statement, but without follow-through, without a way to hold those in charge accountable--without leverage, in other words--those in charge wait patiently for protestors to get tired and disperse.

The way I see it, protests are networking opportunities. "Oh, you're against this pipeline too? Let's be friends!"

A protest is the birthplace of revolution, not revolution itself. A protest is the means, not the end. It's where like-minded people meet and design a proper strategy for change.

More than protests, we need plans. More than anger, we need wisdom. More than violence, we need purpose. What's the endgame? What's the goal? To stop a pipeline from being built? To put an end of police brutality? To eliminate political corruption and strip corporations of their influence in government?

Whatever the cause, it starts with you.

Said by the Weary

"Abandon all attachment to the results of action and attain supreme peace."

- Bhagavad Gita 

I've had some unpleasant jobs in the past. I've had filthy, mind-numbing, labor intensive gigs that sucked the life right out of me. I've had dangerous jobs where a misstep or moment of inattention could result in missing fingers or a 100-foot fall.

After a few years of this kind of work I was struck by a strange question: what makes a certain job or task unpleasant/mundane/mind-numbing?

Why is it that jack-hammering a floor-slab in a four-foot crawl space sucks while installing baseboards and crown moulding is fun? Both are tasks. One is more physically taxing, to be sure, while the other requires more precision and concentration, but objectively speaking neither is "good" or "bad."

The only real difference between the two is personal preference. How you view a task determines whether it is "pleasant" or "fucking horrible." It's an arbitrary distinction. Want proof? If certain tasks were objectively pleasant or unpleasant, people would be unanimous in their agreement. In reality, you will meet people who like this kind of work and others who despise it, people who enjoy this task and others who dread it.

As it turns out, my discovery was no discovery at all. Philosophers from east and west have been saying pretty much the same thing for centuries. Every value judgment you make is a fabrication, a label generated by your mind and attached to an external object and activity. The labelling process is unconscious until you take charge of it. 

Instead of griping about my dirty, gruelling job, I started looking at it from a different angle. "This isn't labour," I began telling myself, "it's a work-out. I'm getting paid--handsomely, I might add--to exercise."

Another way to look at it...

Suddenly, demolition work didn't seem so bad.

In any case, most to us don't have a choice: we have to work whether we want to or not. Might as well find a way to enjoy it, or at least make the best of it. Need to change the way you perceive work? My good buddy Kahlil Gibran might be able to help you with that.

Always you have been told that work is a curse and labor a misfortune. 

But I said to you that when you work you fulfill a part of the earth’s furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born 

And in keeping yourself with labor you are in truth loving life, 

And to love life through labor is to be intimate with life’s inmost secret.

Life is labor. If you love life, you best start loving labor. How does that Bible scripture go again? If you don't work, you don't eat. And if you don't eat, you don't live. Life and labour are inseparable. Accept it, adapt, and move forward.

Hercules didn't whine about his 12 Labours

You have been told also that life is darkness, and in your weariness you echo what was said by the weary. 

And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is urge, 

And all urge is blind save when there is knowledge,

And all knowledge is vain save when there is work, 

And all work is empty save when there is love;

And what is it to work with love? 

It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own spirit.

This doesn't mean that you must love your job, only that you should work with love, by focusing your all into the task at hand. Restrict yourself to the present moment, put your entire mind into whatever it is you're doing, and you will find that the painfully slow days now fly by.

And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work.

In other words, if you spend your days whining about your job, you better spend your evenings looking for a new one. We have to work to live, sure, but you get to choose where you work.

If you aren't searching for a way out, then your current job must not be so bad. So do yourself a favour and fixate on the positive aspects, the ones that stop you from quitting.

Don't echo what was said by the weary. You're better than that. Make the best of your current situation while constantly looking for ways to improve it.

And whenever possible, work with love.

/rant over

Living Arrows

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. 

And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. 

They come through you but not from you.

- Kahlil Gibran 

It's easy to miss the wonders that surround us. Most of us are too busy going through the motions to realize just how fascinating life really is. We take things for granted and no longer see the little miracles of everyday existence.

Children have no such problem. They're fascinated by everything. Nothing is mundane to a child. Everything sings with mystery. Everything is novel, new, bewildering and captivating. Everything is worth questioning.

As we move steadily toward adulthood we lose this sense of fascination with the world. We stop seeing things and see their labels instead. It's not that we forget how to look at the world properly but that we're gradually programmed not to. Our questions get answered or dismissed. We drape a veil over the mystery and call it solved. Curiosity goes into hibernation and we surrender to the labels.

A good way of lifting the veil is to contemplate things we take for granted, things that we accept without hesitation or question.

Take procreation, for example. People have kids. Big deal! They've been doing it for hundreds of thousands of years. Even so, the act of procreation is awe-inspiring on a variety of different levels. Even at its most basic, the act involves two people connecting in some way, be it emotional, psychological, or physical, and making a new person together. Each parent supplies a bit of raw material and the mother, blessed vehicle of life, nurtures and brings the seed to bloom.

It's primordial, like a cell dividing or a chemical reaction, and the result is a brand new human being.

In The Prophet, Lebanese poet Kahlil Gibran offers some insights on the act of procreation and parents' subsequent role in their children's lives. For instance, he tells us

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

Instilling children with the ideas of yesterday is counter to Nature, which operates by progressing, not regressing. We should give our children the tools necessary so that they may discover their own beliefs. If those beliefs happen to differ from our own, so be it. They are their own people. 

Gibran goes on:

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. 

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. 

Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness; 

For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.

What can any parent do save offer a stable foundation for her children to stand on? This is the very basis of human progress, one generation building upon the works of generations past, not maintaining the status quo but improving upon it.

Note also that in Gibran's metaphor, the parent is merely the bow, not the archer. In some way this is true, as we are conditioned to act and think the way we do by our past experiences, culture, and beliefs. Even so, I'd like to think that parents play some part in the aiming, which often works to the detriment of their children.

How many parents try to steer their children toward certain paths only to have it backfire? How many groom their children from birth to be professional athletes, doctors, and lawyers only to have them do a 180?

If you are a parent, remember that the children in your care don't belong to you. You are not their owner, master, or boss. They are not a coat rack for you to hang your failed dreams upon. You are their custodian, their guide, and it is your job to give them the tools necessary to succeed regardless of the path they decide to walk.

Aim your living arrows not at the target your parents missed when firing you into the world, but at the target best suited to your children's passions, skills, and talents.

/rant over 

Ego

I've written about the importance of knowing yourself a number of times on this blog. Today I'd like to tell you about the single biggest obstacle to accurate self-knowledge: that sonofabitch, the Ego.

The Ego isn’t you: it’s an amalgamation of all your false-identities. When you identify with stuff that isn't you, you're giving life to the Ego.

Your beliefs, opinions, biases, ideas, judgments, job, possessions, accomplishments, and relationships are not you: they're just the things you do. 

Luckily the Ego doesn't control you: it merely tricks you into acting out. It pulls your strings and you dance like a little puppet.

When someone calls your deeply-held beliefs into question, the Ego says, “Are you gonna let him talk about you like that?”

When someone points out a mistake you've made, the Ego says, “Quick! Blame somebody else!”

When someone criticizes you, the Ego says, “Don’t listen to her: she’s just jealous.”

The Ego pretends that it's looking out for you, that it's defending you from the unjustified attacks of lesser people. In reality, the Ego only looks out for itself.

Eckhart Tolle has a lot to say about the Ego in his book The Power of Now. For instance, 

If you identify with a mental position, then if you are wrong, your mind-based sense of self is seriously threatened with annihilation. So you as the ego cannot afford to be wrong. To be wrong is to die. Wars have been fought over this, and countless relationships have broken down.

The good news is, once you stop identifying with mental positions you lose the desire to defend them.

If you don’t identify with your work, you have no problem admitting your mistakes.

If you don’t identify with (or worse, idealize) your imperfect state, you gladly listen to criticism.

The sting that accompanies your wounded pride is an illusion. The sting is Ego’s finger jabbing, not at your pride, which cannot be wounded, but at your insecurities, doubts, and anxieties. It appeals to emotion, manipulates, and pushes your buttons.   

It deflects, redirects, and projects.

Everything that stems from the Ego is toxic. Even when the Ego tries to make you feel good, it does so in a destructive way.

The Ego uplifts you by bringing others down. It boosts your self-worth by decreasing the self-worth of others.

The Ego loves nothing more than to help you demolish another person's hopes and dreams so that you might climb up the mountain of rubble left behind and feel, for a brief moment, that you're the winner.

Winner of what, exactly? Of being a douche bag. Congratulations!

Want to throw a wrench in the Ego's plans? Be vigilant. Listen for the Ego's sweet whispers. Tolle wisely advises us to "Watch out for any kind of defensiveness within yourself. What are you defending? An illusory identity, an image in your mind, a fictitious entity."

Being offended is a telltale sign of the Ego's handiwork.

Question your basic assumptions and opinions. This will help you detach from them and rob the Ego of its fuel.

It's not that you should abandon your opinions, only that you should recognize them as just that: your opinions. They don't belong to anyone else. In truth, they aren't even yours. You didn't create them, after all. You're just lugging them around in your mind. They're mental baggage.

If someone wants to question your beliefs, let them! What does it matter to you?

If someone points out your mistake, take ownership. The only people who never make mistakes are the people who don't do any work.

And if someone criticizes you, take it with an open mind. Genuinely consider what they've said. Do as Seneca advises and put yourself on trial. If you find no evidence to support your critic's charges, you can disregard them calmly, knowing full well that they are unfounded.

If however you find some truth in the charges brought against you, thank your critic and take heart: you're one step closer to becoming your best self.

Morning Prayer part 2

"When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: the people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous, and surly." 

- Marcus Aurelius

Compared to Aurelius' other morning prayer, the above probably sounds a little pessimistic. Whereas before he urges himself to "think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive--to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love," he now prepares himself for a long line of unpleasant, unsavoury, and difficult people.

But is it pessimistic to prepare yourself for the inevitable, or simply pragmatic?

We must all interact with people who fall outside our circle of compassion. It's foolish to go around thinking we will get along with everyone we meet. People have different values, opinions, and habits, and it stands to reason that these will differ from your own. And good thing, too. Imagine what a dull world it would be if everyone agreed on everything all the time!

Although Aurelius is prepared to encounter all types of unpleasant people, he takes great care not to resent them, reminding himself that "they are like this because they can’t tell good from evil." In other words, it's not their fault that they're meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous, or surly: it's because they are blissfully ignorant or because they cling to a skewed perception of reality. They value the wrong things because they confuse the good with the ill and thus fall into negative patterns of thought and behavior.

Aurelius continues:

But I have seen the beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own—not of the same blood or birth, but of the same mind, and possessing a share of the divine. 

Rather than hate these wrongdoers, Aurelius feels a sense of brotherhood with them. Though they know it not, they too possess a splinter of the universal intellect and so there is a chance that they will one day see the beauty of good and the ugliness of evil.

And so none of them can hurt me. No one can implicate me in ugliness. Nor can I feel angry at my relative, or hate him. 

No matter what these wrongdoers do, they cannot touch Aurelius. They cannot even incite his anger, only his sympathy.

We were born to work together like feet, hands, and eyes, like the two rows of teeth, upper and lower. To obstruct each other is unnatural. To feel anger at someone, to turn your back on him: these are obstructions.

Those ignorant to the nature of good and evil are like the malfunctioning parts of a machine: they have fallen out of harmony with the whole and now hinder its proper functioning. To feel anger towards others--even those who purposely hinder the working of the human machine--is not only unnatural but an obstruction to right living.

Aurelius' words also happen to fall in line with one of Christ's most powerful teachings: that we should love our enemies and do good to those that hate us. Indeed, what merit is there in loving those who reciprocate our love and treat us well? It's natural to love those who love us back. The real challenge is to love those who spite us, insult us, obstruct us, and otherwise mean us harm.

We're so accustomed to fighting fire with fire--to countering insults with insults, aggression with aggression, and so on--that Aurelius' advice may sound backward. And yet a brief examination of our tendencies (and, more importantly, their results) shows them to be fallacious in the worst way.

Wars always fail to resolve the conflicts that spark them. Interpersonal disagreements worsen and become grudges when both parties remain disagreeable. Disease and illness are compounded by poor diet and lifestyle choices.

A force cannot be overcome except by its exact opposite.    

Next time you interact with someone who chafes you, try focusing on their good qualities, however few and minute. Try putting yourself in their shoes or thinking of a time when you irritated and annoyed others. Ask yourself, "What faults of mine resemble most closely this person's faults?" And lastly, try showing them kindness, understanding, and love.

They might not acknowledge or appreciate your good treatment, but then you're not doing it for the recognition.

You do it for yourself, because you know better. You know that people were made for one another, that the only thing that can conquer hate, anger, and the other toxic fruits of bad thought and wrong action are the forces of love, empathy, and sympathy.

You know that by showing kindness to the unkind, generosity to the greedy, and understanding to the ignorant, you fulfill your purpose and serve as a beacon of goodness for those around you.

/rant over

War

Ex-smokers often talk about the difficulty of breaking the habit. "The hardest part," they say, "is right after breakfast," or "during coffee break," or "right after sex." Why? Because that's when they were accustomed to lighting up. So right after breakfast, when they would normally be having their first cigarette of the day but aren't, their mind starts shouting at them.

"What are you doing?" it cries, tapping its watch. "You should be smoking right now. It's time!"

It's not the physical addiction that's difficult to overcome: it's the habit.

Habits are like ruts in your life-path. They're formed and deepened by repetition. Henry David Thoreau wrote,

As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.

After a year of writing daily, these last weeks have felt strange to say the least. Like the ex-smoker, my brain keeps telling me I should be here working on my next post.

So what am I doing instead?

Preparing.

You can't charge blindly into war. You need a strategy. You need to sharpen your weapons and train your soldiers. 

Every time that voice pipes up and yells at me to go write, I put my head down and keep working.

Remember the plan, I tell myself. 

First, I'm putting my arsenal together. And since my war is an internal one, a war of words, it is only fitting that I start with my notes.

Every book I've read int he last year is filled with highlighted passages and sections. These are the bits I want to study in more detail or the lines that rang with truth. These are my weapons and I've spent the last two weeks making a detailed inventory of them by manually copying all my notes into word documents.

It's as exciting as it sounds, folks, but there's no avoiding it.

I'm sure there's an easier way of doing this. I could probably export my Kindle notes without typing them up all but then I wouldn't get to revisit some of the ideas that jumped out at me over the last year.

Being organized facilitates the work ahead. Sure, right now it feels like I'm wasting time, like I'm shirking some responsibility or avoiding an inevitability, but I know very well that this is Resistance trying to slow me down.

When I finally get down to the task at hand, it will be with swords sharpened and armour polished. Not only that, but with a strategy for winning the war. No more going in blind for me.

Once I get all my notes transcribed, I'll start labeling and organizing them thematically. And in order to silence my nagging mind, I'll share some of my favourite highlights right here and throw in some rambling commentary to boot.

And what better way to start than with a few lines from Steven Pressfield's most excellent book, The War of Art!

The premise to Pressfield's book is simple to grasp. According to him,

Most of us have two lives. The life we live, and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands Resistance.

Resistance is a force generated by the ego and its sole function is to stop you from bettering yourself. Whether it's a diet, new business venture, or that book you want to write, Resistance will find ways to confound and trip you up. It lies, cheats, appeals to your fears and insecurities. It's that little voice that tells you you're not good enough, that there's no point, that it won't work anyway.

Look in your own heart. Unless I'm crazy, right now a still, small voice is piping up, telling you as it has ten thousand times before, the calling that is yours and yours alone. You know it. No one has to tell you.

That's your unlived life. You know what it is just as well as you know your own name. You might bury it under the worries and fixations of the ego but beneath those layers of bullshit, you know exactly what your soul desires. This is the life you were meant for but fear pursuing.

And unless I'm crazy, you're no closer to taking action on it than you were yesterday or will be tomorrow. You think Resistance isn't real? Resistance will bury you.

Indeed! Like an anchor it will bog you down mentally, physically, and emotionally. When you get home and complete the mundane tasks of adulthood, the last thing you want to do is [paint/write/organize/exercise/think/study/build/plan] You're exhausted from carrying Resistance around all day. [Painting/writing/organizing/exercising/thinking/studying/building/planning] just feels like more work, anyway.

What you need to do is relax. Put your laptop away! You had a long day. Don't lace up your runners. Don't start that project. See that couch over there? It's warm and comfy and it's been waiting for you all day.

And then, when you're at the office, job site, or shop doing real work, you think to yourself, "I wish I could do what I love for a living!"

You could! But you never will unless you start. Only whenever you get the chance to start you cop out. You're tired. Not in the mood. Work was brutal. You just want to watch TV and unwind.

Meanwhile, you're not getting any closer to manifesting your unlived life. You're drifting aimlessly, knocking from port to port and acting lost when in reality you have the map and compass in your damn hands! And you feel this vague gnawing in the pit of your being, this nagging sensation that says you should be doing something else, that you were meant for something greater.

And you're right!

We come into this world with a specific, personal destiny. We have a job to do, a calling to enact, a self to become. We are who we are from the cradle, and we're stuck with it.

No, you haven't been robbed of your rightful destiny; you simply haven't taken steps to claim it.

Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it.

Stop waiting around on uncertainties and future promises. Whatever your calling, whoever you need to become, the time is now. Don't surrender to procrastination, doubt, and the other lies Resistance peddles. It's your job to become the best possible you there is.

Now get started!